154 KANSAS ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 



Saline county, by Dr. Joseph Henry, who, though only an amateur and over 

 70 years old, T^'as nevertheless an enthusiastic collector. He died in October, 

 18S7. Renaiild and Cardot determined Dr. Joseph Henry's collection of Saline 

 county mosses, which extended through more than three years of careful 

 work, and was published with Cragin's last list in the Botanical Gazette, vol. 

 XVII, p. 81. There were 40 species added to the old list, making 93 species 

 in all (besides eight varieties) reported from Kansas in 1892. 



I find thai; with the addition of the mosses published in Smyth's Check-list 

 last year, with the 30 additional species which I have collected, not previously 

 reported from Kansas (besides one entirely new species), that we have a list 

 of 165 species. This list will probably be increased when the remainder of 

 my material has been identified. Most of my specimens were collected in the 

 eastern third of the state. The larger part of the collecting has been done 

 in Wyandotte, Riley, and Pottawatomie counties, with a few specimens from 

 Bourbon county, collected by Rev. John Bennett; from Franklin county, by 

 Grace R. Meeker; from Shawnee county, by J. W. Beede and B. B. Smyth; 

 from Atchison county, by E. B. Knerr, and a few from Wilson county, col- 

 lected by Frank McClung; I also have one specimen from Rooks county, sent 

 by E. Bai-tholomew, and a few from Trego, Gi-eeley, and Anderson counties, 

 collected by myself. The kindly assistance of the above collectors has aided 

 me very much in securing material for study and comparison. 



Bryophytes, or mosses, rank fourth in the subdivisions of the vegetable 

 kingdom, coming just above Fungi and below Pteridophytes, the vascular 

 Cryptogams or ferns. The Bryophytes include two orders: the Hepaticae, 

 or liverwort mosses, and Muscineae, or true mosses. The order Muscineae 

 is characterized by two generations — sexual and asexual. The sexual gen- 

 eration contains abundant chlorophyl, and is the direct growth of the spore, 

 or in mosses preceded by the more simple protonema, which, though chloro- 

 phyllose, does not bear the sexual organs, but produces buds for the leafy 

 plant or stem, which leafy stem constitutes the moss plant proper, producing 

 the sexual organs. 



The female sexual organ, when fertilized, produces the sporophore, or 

 asexual generation; which is very different from the sexual generation, and 

 produces nothing but spores. This sporogonium, produced from the fer- 

 tilized oospore of the female flower, is not organically connected with the 

 first generation, but obtains its nourishment from it by absorption, its base 

 being firmly embedded in the tissue at the apex of the stem. This sporocarp 

 finally completes its growth, and develops the spores, ready to germinate and 

 <igain produce the sexual generation, thus completing the cycle of growth. 



The spores of mosses vary in size from one-fifth to 1-500 mm. in diameter; 

 the very minute mosses often having the largest spores; there only being a 

 few in each capsule, as in Ephemerum, Micromitrium, and others, while many 

 of the larger species have the capsule filled with many very fine spores, as in 

 Hypnum. Cylindrothecium, and others. See plates. 



The size and surface-markings of the spore are often distinguishing char- 

 acteristics between species and genera. 



The color of spores varies from a dark reddish brown to a light greenish 

 yellow, or almost hyaline, but the usual color is brown. 



The surface may be smooth, papillose, verruculose, or slightly irregular. 

 (See plates.) 



The shape also varies from spherical to an irregular globoid or angular, 

 the spherical being most common. (See plates.) 



